The Pop Star Next Door

by Aleah Barley

  “Our baby,” Anna confirmed. She’d wanted to wait until after the party to tell him, but somehow this seemed like the perfect moment. “What do you say, Maddox? You ready to have two sons?”

  “No way.” Laughter made the crevices at the side of his eyes deepen. “I want a girl this time. A blonde haired blue eyed girl with a voice like an angel—just like her mother.”

  His head tilted down until their lips met. Anna closed her eyes, losing herself in his kiss. The fresh scent of soap and the tangy taste of fresh lemonade. “I love you so much,” he murmured against her mouth. “Anna How—No. Anna Maddox.” A slight pause, just long enough for another soft kiss. “I love you so much, Anna Maddox.”

  “That’s a damn good thing,” Anna’s laughter bubbled out of her, light and joyous, “Because I love you too.”

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  The clowns were on the warpath. They’d been angry ever since New York—the Big Fumble—but things had gotten worse lately. Whoopee cushions in the office and whiskey bottles spilling out of their caravan every morning. A smart woman wouldn’t care, but then a smart woman would never have taken a job managing the Black Shadow Circus, a dog and pony show with more dogs than acts.

  Belle-Anne Black poked her head around the side of the horse trailer, keeping an eye out for any brightly colored suits or funny hats. All she saw was Frank Smithson, her second-in-command.

  The elderly lot manager was wearing wrinkled brown coveralls covered in street grime, engine grease, and horse manure. His hands fumbled in his pockets, pulling out a mint tin that had seen better days. Gnarly fingers flipped the tin open, carefully removing a single mint.

  Mist condensed against Belle’s neck, small droplets running down her back. Her options were clear. She could walk down the narrow alley between the horse trailer and the exercise yard, exchanging a few pleasant words with a man she liked, or she could double back and take the direct route across the parking lot towards the tent.

  Quicker.

  Shorter.

  Chance of clowns.

  She stuck her hands deep in her pockets and turned around. Better a pie to the face than having to talk to Frank about her feelings. Ever since her father’s death he’d been trailing after her, desperate to talk about her feelings.

  Worse, what if he asked where they were going next? By all rights they should be shut down for the winter by now, the trailers parked in their Florida campground, not unpacking the trucks after yet another small jump. Setting up the big top at a county fairground in Michigan.

  The clowns weren’t the only ones who were angry.

  And if she told Frank the truth? If she told him that she’d sold their winter campground to settle her father’s debts? Her gut clenched tight, causing a pain in her side. She couldn’t tell him. Not now. Not until she’d figured out where they were going next.

  There was movement everywhere she looked, the ground crew unpacking the brightly colored railings, performers double checking to make sure their equipment hadn’t been damaged during the last move. Someone had lit a big bonfire in the middle of camp and a few of the older workers were gathered around it warming their hands.

  “Belle!” Eight-year-old Petra Jarvis raced out of her parents’ trailer, a small brown dog yipping at her heels. “We’re going to make marshmallows after dinner!”

  The girl’s blue eyes were wide, her cheeks red with enthusiasm. It was more than her tangled strawberry curls and angelic smile; Petra was a born performer, third generation circus. She’d made her stage debut at the tender age of six. She could command attention from every person in the big top. Subtle wasn’t in her DNA.

  A dozen different men and women snapped around to focus on Belle. Faces she’d known since birth twisted into frowns and snarls. They were all experienced performers; they knew that some seasons were worse than others, but that didn’t mean they were happy about it.

  Belle shifted uncomfortably. There was nowhere to run, nowhere to hide. A single step backwards would be seen as weakness. She’d lost everything else, she couldn’t afford to lose the respect of the troupe; they were the only family she had left.

  Belle took a deep breath—forcing air down into strangled lungs—and launched her body forward. Petra wasn’t the only one who could draw attention with a smile, a laugh, and a single raise of her hand. Belle’s family had been in the circus forever. She was the tenth generation, and she’d done it all; tumbling, juggling, and even flying from one end of the tent to the other on the trapeze.

  Sprinting across the parking lot Belle raised up a hand, waving to the company. “Hello, everybody!”

  Her movements were exaggerated but well-planned. She shifted forward onto the balls of her feet then threw herself towards the ground. From the outside, it looked like she’d tripped on the soggy ground, but no one moved to see if she was unharmed. They all just leaned forward, watching as she tumbled end over end. Tired muscles screamed as she did two forward rolls then popped up into a front handspring. Her arms stretched towards the sky for the final ‘Ta-da.’

  The trick was an old one, she’d done it a million times before, but that didn’t mean it was easy. Smiles broke out around the yard, there were even a couple of claps.

  “Looking good, Belle,” a call from somewhere near the small trailer that they used as a cookhouse. The rough voice of a man who’d smoked two packs of cigarettes a day for most of his life. Keith Aldridge, the clown king.

  For a moment, her body tensed, waiting for the insult to come, but then everyone else was shouting too. Laughing, smiling, cheering her name.

  The circus was happy to find a little magic on a rainy afternoon.

  H

  Less than a mile from the fairgrounds, in the back of Buck Falls’ granite town hall with its mighty Corinthian columns, Police Chief Graham Tyler was secure in the knowledge that the town’s most troubling criminal was a teenager with a case of spray-paint who liked to call himself a ‘street artist.’

  Bored but secure.

  Buck Falls was an oasis in a world full of trouble, a small town without any big city problems like drugs or theft. The last murder had been thirty years earlier, and—God willing—the next wouldn’t come for another thirty years. Graham had experienced a lifetime of excitement in his misspent youth and the years he’d spent in the Navy. These days his life was lazy, dull, and predictable.

  Damn it.

  Tiffany Phelps—the dispatcher who was the police force’s only other full-time employee—stood up to get a cup of coffee, and he leaned forward across his crowded desk to ease the boredom with a glimpse of her legs.

  It was the end of summer, just turning into fall, but the weather was still warm, and Tiffany still hadn’t traded in her endless rotation of flirty dresses and thigh skimming skirts for more substantial clothing. On a scale from one to ten, with ten being Carmen Electra and one being Myrtle down at the diner who’d been enjoying her own good cooking for the past fifty years, Tiffany was a solid nine with excellent legs, especially for a woman old enough to be Graham’s mother.

  Too old for him, and—the truth was—too wild. Tiffany’s last boyfriend had been a biker with long hair and tattoos on his knuckles. That didn’t make her legs any less enjoyable to look at.

  Bring, briiing. The sharp ring of the phone made him jump, papers scattered across the floor. In the other room, he could hear Tiffany laughing.

  The police station was empty this Thursday afternoon, and the next appointment on his calendar wasn’t for three days. There was no reason why he couldn’t pick up his own phone. He reached out a hand, grasping the heavy black receiver. Sitting back in his seat, Graham put the phone to his ear. “Hello.”

  A subtle shift of his weight had his old leather office chair turning to give him a view out his office window. Rusty leaves fluttered in the afternoon light. The fall colors were coming in strong, a boon to the small town’s tourist industry.

  Graham made a mental note to find h
is rake. “What’s up?”

  “Is that any way to answer your phone?” a belligerent growl from the town’s mayor, a man who had promised that he wouldn’t interfere in police business when he’d hired Graham as chief eight years earlier. “I always say, ‘Mayor Tyler’s office. Mayor Tyler speaking.’”

  “Thank you, Dad.” They’d had this conversation before, at least half a dozen times. Graham had long since given up trying to argue that he was younger than his father... fresher... a completely different person. “I’ll take that under advisement.”

  “It’s important that you give off an air of professionalism at all times,” James Tyler continued. “Why isn’t Tiffany answering your phone?”

  “Tiffany’s busy.” He could still hear the woman’s chuckles in the other room.

  Back when he’d been a decorated Navy Seal with a team full of guys to watch his back no one ever laughed at him, but Tiffany had been working at the same desk since Graham was in diapers. After he’d been hired on as chief, his first call had been to tell her the news and make sure that she was sticking around. She knew absolutely everyone in Buck Falls: waitresses, business executives, and bright-eyed school kids. Underneath her fluffy exterior, she was a one-woman community news bulletin, an invaluable resource for a small town police chief.

  “Were you calling to speak to her?”

  “Tiffany? Nope, I’m sure I’ll see her around.” A sniff. “There’s trouble coming. I thought I’d give you a heads up.”

  “Trouble coming?” School was letting out down the block. Out the window, Graham could see children pouring out onto the streets dressed in brightly-colored jackets, their backpacks slung haphazardly over one shoulder. They were shouting and laughing.

  Happy.

  Carefree.

  Some headed straight towards the yellow school buses lined up on the street, but most took the opportunity to run in the crisp autumn air.

  A small boy in a blue sweatshirt darted across the street without checking for oncoming traffic, making a beeline towards the Skyline Diner and the soft serve ice cream that would be gone a week later.

  The only trouble that Graham could see coming was his nephew’s sugar rush. Myrtle had strict instructions to only give Trevor a small cone, but somehow the kid always ended up with a hot fudge sundae with a cherry on top.

  “Aren’t you being a little melodramatic?”

  “There’s some sort of traveling show setting up at the fairgrounds.”

  A traveling show. Graham bit back a smile. Something new, something different, he could see how his father might call that trouble. He leaned back in his chair, allowing himself to relax. The only trouble in town was his father’s wandering mind, and the perpetual rivalry between Buck Falls and the next town over, Whispering Spring.

  Of course, it wouldn’t hurt to double check.

  “There’s no law against people renting the fairgrounds.”

  “There should be,” James said. “I was out that way this morning. Some of the women had hardly any clothes on, the floozies. The men weren’t much better. There’s going to be trouble, you can count on it. Some sort of fight. You should head them off, send them packing.”

  “That’s not really my problem.” Graham’s eyes squeezed shut. Talking to his father was an instant headache.

  He was the police chief, damn it. A well-trained officer of the law who spent most of his days rescuing cats from trees and searching for misplaced pies. Harassing members of the general public was not in his job description.

  “They haven’t done anything wrong. Besides, the fairgrounds are in Whispering Spring. It’s not my job to head anyone off.”

  “I would have done it, back in the day.”

  “Right.” Back in the day. Back when the Tyler family ran the little town like their own private fiefdom. Corrupt wasn’t the right word, but it wasn’t wrong either.

  After college Graham hadn’t come back to town. He’d hit the road, determined to live his life free of ethical quandaries. He’d ended up in the Navy, putting down insurgents in Iraq and Afghanistan. Risking his life for the United States of America. Oorah.

  Now, he was back sitting in the same building where his father had worked for forty years. His mother had always liked to say ‘the road to hell was paved with good intentions.’

  The same damn chair with the off kilter base and the rickety wheels that countless relatives had sat on before him.

  “If your brother were alive, he’d do it but—”

  Graham held his breath, waiting to see if his father would finish his sentence. Not that it was necessary. David was dead. Nothing either one of them could do would change that.

  He took a deep breath, forcing air down into his lungs.

  It wouldn’t hurt to go out and take a look around. The fairground was only a few minutes from the old farmhouse he’d bought when he moved back to town. The hardscrabble heap had taken a lot of work to make habitable, but now it was warm and cozy. His. If he cut through his backfield, the fairgrounds were only a short walk away.

  The more he thought about it, the better the idea seemed. He could leave the office early, make his father happy, and maybe even get to see some women dressed in hardly any clothes. Floozies. Hell, he’d be happy to meet any woman who hadn’t known him since he was a baby.

  Women who would only be in town until the show left the fairgrounds.

  His lips pulled back into a wolfish grin. “I’ll get right on that.”

  “Good.” His father went quiet.

  Now that his father’s opinion had been heard, they didn’t have much to talk about. Long silences punctuated by short exchanges, that was the way they’d communicated Graham’s entire life. There was not a doubt in his mind that his grandfather had talked to his father the same way, the same awkward pauses echoing back through time all the way to his great-great-great-grandfather. The town’s founder.

  David had been different. David had always talked to him like he was a real man, someone to look up to. It had gotten him killed.

  “Who are you taking to the Winter Social?”

  Graham rolled his eyes. “I’m not dating anyone. You know that.”

  “I’m not talking about forever. It’s just one night. You should have some fun every once in a while,” the old man said, by way of goodbye.

  The line went dead, leaving behind a familiar knot of anger deep in Graham’s chest. No matter what he did, he couldn’t seem to have a conversation with his own father that didn’t end in misery. It was a cycle he refused to let repeat with his own children.

  A moment later he was slipping on his jacket, a rough wool pea coat that covered his uniform shirt. In New York, he’d worn an official department issued windbreaker with his name embroidered on the front, recognizable from a mile away, but the pea coat was comfortable. It fit over his broad, muscular shoulders. More importantly, it covered his gun.

  A quick word to Tiffany to have her forward any emergency calls to his cell-phone, and he was out the door. He got in his car and rolled the windows down, enjoying the sounds of the birds singing in the trees and children shrieking. Eventually, the road turned rough under the tires of his town- issued four by four with ‘Buck Falls Police’ splashed across the outside. A couple turns and ten more minutes down the road, the cracked asphalt fell away, replaced with gravel and mud.

  The air smelled like dry leaves, river water, and burning meat. Someone was hurrying to get in one last barbecue before the season ended.

  Graham’s stomach rumbled. Breakfast had been hours earlier and somehow he’d managed to work through lunch, going over the paperwork and double-checking his files for an upcoming court case. Dinner was still a few hours away.

  The gravel driveway to his place was half a mile long. He parked under the old farmhouse’s overhang and started walking. His pace picked up as he passed a couple of blackberry-covered sheds and the mammoth 250-year-old barn followed by two more fields full of brambles and thorns.

 
Melodic birdsong was replaced by something else; the ring of hammers hitting steel; the rough growl of a truck’s engine; shouting, screaming, and laughing.

  There were people, lots of them, more than the usual traveling shows.

  It wasn’t just the people either.

  Graham might be a cop, but he was a cop from a farm town. A single breath and he could smell—even taste—the horses, sweaty and muscular. Climbing over the split rail fence on the far side of the property, his head lowered slightly. His shoulders hunched forward against the breeze.

  There were two semi-trailers parked on the far side of the fairgrounds, packed in among mud-colored trucks, ten-year-old sedans, and battered mobile homes.

  Whoever had rented the fairgrounds wasn’t just putting on a show. They were living there as well. Men, women, and children scurrying back and forth about their daily routine; cooking food over mobile stoves and open pit fires, hanging up wet laundry, and hurrying to put together something in the middle of the fairgrounds—miles of heavy fabric and long steel beams.

  Dogs of every size, shape, and possible description raced across the ground. Wiry terriers were digging under a rust covered Toyota and a matched pair of golden retrievers was fighting over a bone. A fluffy cream-colored mutt attached itself to Graham’s foot, needle sharp teeth digging into his polished shoes. He gave a quick shake of his leg.

  Nothing happened. He tried again.

  “Careful, Gilly,” A gravelly voice came from the shadows. “That thing’s a monster. You’re not careful, it’ll take your arm off.”

  Straightening slightly, Graham took a cautious step sideways. The dog on his foot couldn’t be more than ten pounds, and half of that was fur. Peering into the fading light, he picked out an elderly man leaning back against a trailer fingering a packet of cigarettes with gnarled digits.

  The man was wearing faded navy coveralls coated in grease and manure. Silvery hair surrounded his head like a pale halo, but his apparent age didn’t make him any weaker. One look was all it took to know that this man was a survivor. All knuckle.